RELATIONSHIPS; WOMEN, MEN AND CHILDREN

The parenting relationship produces you and your relationships

We need to become aware of parenting practices, behaviors, techniques, attitudes that produce healthy, happy people, not controllers. (These same techniques work in all relationships). Our goal should be to be self-disciplined and responsible (not controlled or controlling), and for our children to be self-disciplined and responsible. Our parents build either a self-disciplined child or a “controlled” child (actually out of control), who is only in control, “disciplined”, when around authority figures. Controlled people tend to sneak around, lie, and manipulate. Controlled children usually “cut loose” when they leave home and are no longer under the controllers’ control. They are not self-disciplined. Many “controlled” children flounder for many years when they leave home.  Our reaction to our children’s behavior determines whether it stays or goes: our behavior has to change too.

Again, effective parenting means raising self-disciplined, responsible children who can go off on their own and be successful and happy: successful in their career (if they choose one) and in relationships. It involves knowing the tools to discipline, communicate, encourage, love, etc. Again, some parents think the way to parent is to “model” proper behavior, and that it will “rub off” on their kids; won’t happen! Raising “nice, polite” kids is nice, but NOT enough. If all you do is sit around and “model” behavior you have missed the boat. Then when your child’s behavior is out of control, you will punish. This will not work. That is called passive, lazy, uninvolved parenting; and it does not work. Parenting has to be active, informed, positive, effective and teaching children life skills, values, etc.  Modeling is a small part of parenting. The more tools and knowledge you have in your skillset the easier parenting is. Knowledge also helps you to relax and not be stressed out. Reading books on parenting is something all parents should do.

Controlling parents sit around and exercise lazy, passive parenting: dictatorial. “You will do as I say”; ( the only problem is they usually forget to tell the child the rules). They usually don’t “lay down the rules” until the child has done something wrong.  They do assume that the child will watch them and do as they do. The problem is, the child sees them being passive, negative, ordering the mother around, ordering them around, yelling, correcting everyone, criticizing everyone, arguing etc. The child learns these behaviors also.

So we want to discipline, not use rewards and punishment, which causes a child to be “other” directed: you do things to get rewards and to avoid punishment instead of because: doing good things, doing well, improvement feels good inside; doing the wrong thing causes consequences, natural and logical, (being inner-directed).  A controller uses rewards and punishment, devised by them, because it is a way to control the child. Punishment is ineffective and so usually escalates and becomes severe punishment or even rage. Punishment/threats can end up erasing a sense of trust and security in a child: “If you do this you are out of here”, or “I will hurt you”: builds fear.  The child then forgets about feeling bad about his act, but rather is “mad” at the parent (resentful) for the unfairness, meanness, hurt. “I don’t trust you; you hurt me”. And punishment spurns revenge. “I will get back at you”. “I will hide from you and lie to avoid severe, unfair punishment”. The tendency to lie is born when a parent uses punishment instead of discipline.  Rewards, praise and punishment are used by controllers as ways to control children (and others). These controllers value perfectionism, being the best, being better than others, materialism; they focus on mistakes, negative possibilities and the end results—such as winning; do not focus on process, creativity, and thought processes. Praise tends to compare children with other children, especially siblings: one is better than the other. This is not good. Siblings will always be different from one another. You cannot compare children. Each is unique with their own strengths and weaknesses.  Encouragement focuses on the strengths of each.

Positive, effective parenting utilizes encouragement, consequences for behavior: both positive and negative behaviors;  communication of rules and consequences up front; communication of expectations; training; good communication and listening; prevention of misbehavior and irresponsibility;  recognizing , discussing and accepting all feelings; teaching and practicing stress management; speaking respectfully; teaching responsibility and values; teaching problem solving and decision making; fun and positives every day; expressing love and appreciation each day; celebrating the wonders of this world with your  child (partner); connect with nature and learn to enjoy simple things, simple wonders; experience joy; kindness and patience.  More on these in future articles.

Encouragement: a relationship skill that controllers lack

In the last article we talked about encouragement: what it is. “Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”  We must find ourselves, and find the ability to appreciate beauty, talent, and uniqueness. Controllers are unable to let their breath be taken; they are too “controlled”.  A controller would look at a rose and feel nothing; have no desire to smell it, touch it. He would only see the thorns and notice that it would be dead soon and need to be cut to keep his garden neat. Remember the old adage that we have to take the thorns with the beauty of the rose; that life is like a rose with beauty and thorns; it is a package deal. A controller only sees the thorns: the things “wrong”; sees how God could’ve done better. This is the way controllers look at children (and at you);  Lots of imperfections!  And “I am great at spotting your imperfections!” ( I am smart and talented).  “I can tell you how to improve!”

A controller would look at a beach and not feel anything; nothing on that beach will take their breath away. A controller looks at children and sees imperfect beings needing lots of instruction and advice; someone who messes up his house and his world. The beauty, wonder, and joy of children will never take his breath away. A controller can practice getting in touch with beauty (and stress management) by sitting in front of a rose: focus only on the rose and its beauty, smell, touch; try to see every petal, every remarkable shape, color change, texture change…everything! Look at the stem, its twists and turns, the thorns, the pattern they are in; let go of all thoughts of the past and future; be in the now; breathe. Do not let your thoughts drift to negatives; negative judgment etc.

Remember, praise is reserved for things well done. It is fake with 2-4 year olds because they don’t do things “very well”; certainly not up to an adult controller’s standards. So, young kids don’t get much “praise” from controllers. They do get lots of advice and criticism: advice after having done a task (having done it “wrong”). We need to use encouragement with young children, and all people. An example of encouragement: my 4 year old daughter brought home a “drawing” from preschool. She said,  “ Here mom. Here is my artwork from today”. It looked like she had folded it 4 ways and scribbled different colors in each of 4 squares. A negative, controller would either put it down without saying anything (because it is not very good, or not worth commenting about: they are disappointed), or say, “ You should not have even bothered; it looks like scribbles”, “what is it?”,(laugh at it), or ”you should try to make it look like something, put more effort into it”, or even use praise: “that’s great”, which is meaningless and fake. The child would then either grab it and throw it away, or quit trying to do artwork at school. The child will be angry at you; feel criticized: all bad.

A positive, encourager would look at it for a while trying to think like a 4 year old, try to imagine what it could be, what thought went into it, if any; and if maybe no thought went into it, you can put some thought into it and teach creativity for the next time.  Say, “ This looks like the 4 seasons to me. I see fall colors in this square, summer, winter, spring colors in these squares. Is that what you saw?” Encouragement teaches you to focus on all the good things in life and teach them to your children. It opens up communication instead of cutting it off. It teaches the child to self-evaluate and self-praise.  My daughter said,  “yea, mom that’s what it is”, with enthusiasm. It teaches you to celebrate children and what they are all about. You may be an adult already who appreciates Picasso and all the greats. But when we have children we have to learn to appreciate children, and celebrate the wonders of childhood; to use enjoyment and enthusiasm.  Encouragement says, “ I enjoy being with you, listening to you”.  Encouragement teaches unconditional love: my love is not tied to good behavior; you doing it the best; Even when I’m correcting you I love you. Not, “I love you only when you do what I say”.  We become teachers, leaders, and managers as parents. Think about it; teachers, leaders, and managers don’t criticize people; focus on negativity and all those negative things controlling parents do. Controlling parents don’t teach anything but negativity, the need to control and have power over others, the “I can’t do it attitude”. They do not build the “courage to be imperfect”.

Controllers can’t encourage because they don’t see the goodness of life, of beauty, of children, of people they are in relationships with; don’t know what to value and encourage. They do not have realistic expectations of people and beauty, this world, and  have controllers’ attitudes: “I wanna do it myself: I do it better; it is better done by me”;  “She needs to do it “right” (like I do it)”. Controllers don’t have(see) opportunities for encouragement; often don’t have things/activities in their lives to encourage(like fun): more in the next article.

When a child(partner) is: working hard, contributing, being kind, having fun, putting forth effort, being “good”, thinking something through, exercising stress management,  being happy, improving,  etc., it is time to encourage!  It is not time to criticize! It is our job to notice and find those times, and create those times. When a child(partner) is having a hard time, is frustrated, etc., it is time to encourage! It is not time to tell them what they did wrong, tell them how to do it better(training/problem solving can be done later); use reflective listening(understand how they are feeling); listen and hug.

Control in a relationship comes from the parenting relationship

So, quality relationships come from two people getting together who were parented in a quality way. Control in a relationship comes from one (or two) person entering a relationship who was parented in a non-quality way.

There is an epidemic of controlling people, mostly men, in this society. It is mostly men because the cycle begins with fathers being dictatorial and controlling with their sons. They tend to be harder on their sons than on their daughters. They want to make sure their sons become strong, forceful, and “the best”. These fathers value the wrong things/traits in their sons. But mostly these fathers were fathered this way. The cycle of unhappy men is carried on from generation to generation by poor parenting—poor fathering. We tend to parent the way that we were parented unless we learn how to do it differently. The only way we learn to do it differently, or want to do it differently, or even realize we need to do it differently, is by realizing that we are unhappy;  that we are not doing well in relationships, and not doing well in life, and that was caused by very poor parenting—usually by our fathers. That is not to discount the dysfunction that can come from our mothers. But here we are talking about control mainly.

What is missing with controlling men is knowing how to develop and keep a strong relationship with a woman. What is missing is knowing how to enjoy the moment and be happy in “the now”. Controlling men are in “perfect” control when they are in their houses alone, or driving alone, or on the computer alone, or at work, as long as they get along with their bosses, or don’t have bosses. Many controllers end up having their own businesses because they cannot handle authority figures. But they want a companion to do things with. This companion is fine as long as they do what the man wants to do, how he wants it done, believes as the man believes, and doesn’t have ideas. Then the man has to be in control of another person—and it is a big job if that person is living with him. And he doesn’t mind having to be in control, except his job of dictating, judging, correcting, scolding, arguing becomes a full-time job. This is fine as long as the woman listens and doesn’t talk back or get mad. But if the woman talks back, or has ideas, he becomes unhappy—and so does she. Happiness for controlling men hinges on being in control—being in their comfort zone. These men do not know how to just be with a person—just have fun, interesting, playful, meaningful conversations—especially with women. They seem to have fun when with men, discussing or participating in sports (if they are raised on sports), or at work with other competitive men—men who sit around criticizing others, criticizing their wives, criticizing the politicians who don’t think like them…but they never learned how to just be with people—women, children, all people.

Happiness involves positive attitudes, self-acceptance, and acceptance of others as they are. These men’s controlling fathers did not model how to be successfully with a woman. They probably saw their fathers being cold, unaffectionate, unaccepting —ordering their mothers around, arguing, criticizing, expecting to be waited on. They did not see their fathers having fun with their mothers, giving affection regularly. Controlling men were raised by controlling fathers (and sometimes controlling mothers).But the scenario is usually controlling father, unhappy mother.

We need to be aware of where we came from and what effect it had on us, and on those we date. Once we are aware then we can become aware of specific “practices”, behaviors, parenting techniques that either produce healthy people or controlling people. Then we can re-parent ourselves if need be, and stay away from controllers: more in future articles.

What Women Want: Men who are able to feel, and enjoy being with a woman, alone

Again, here, we focus on middle age dating: the land of lots of divorced men and women, and lots of never married men. The questions that always arise are:  What caused your marriage to end?  Why have you never married?

After getting lots of vague and unbelievable answers, like, “We had not had sex in 10 years”, and after talking with lots of middle age women, I have concluded that many men just never learned how to be with a woman:  how to nurture a relationship with a woman, such as having fun with a woman, doing things that are not manly or kid oriented; how to be romantic and sexy, use “foreplay” daily, without the need for “sex”: affectionate and sexually playful; initiating lots of sitting close, hugging, kissing, touching  without the expectation of sex (in fact withholding sex after much such things can be wonderful); spending lots of quality time with your partner, including planning and executing “dates”  and play time; how to feel, be sensual, feel all your senses  and your surroundings, see and feel beauty and the wonderful qualities of your mate, and get into being in beautiful settings and around wonderful events: sunrises, sunsets, full moons, stars, beautiful trees, flowers…

Many middle age men are work-a-holics.  They enjoy their work, feel capable and skilled there. They say they are happy; But they need to also become relationship-a-holics if they want their relationship to thrive and prosper. Their partners are not happy. If men worked as hard at their relationships with women as they work “at work” , their relationships would not likely fail. They have been trained and have experience at “work”, but have not been trained or put forth any effort to learn about quality relationships with women.

Many of these men will say, “ I am fun.”  What does that mean?  His kids thought he was fun. His male friends think he is fun. But his wife did not think he was fun. They did not go out on “dates” alone, or on vacations alone. He did not plan fun alone with his wife on a regular basis, doing couple things, not just guy things such as sports… It takes being thoughtful and creative and planful and giving.

As middle age adults we have to be willing to rediscover and learn how to be alone with a partner; learn and discover new outings, new ways of having fun(playing) and exploring and getting to know our partners. We have to let go of our childhood and young adult ways of “having fun”: getting drunk, cruising for women, going to bars, sharing sob stories over a few drinks… and “days of parenting” ways of having fun, with the kids around, and discover one-on-one with the opposite sex as a middle aged person. We literally should reinvent ourselves at different stages of life, and let go of old attitudes:  “I don’t drink that because I got very sick once from it”,  “I don’t sit on the beach and roast” (his definition of the beach, from bad memories of sunburns, etc);  “I don’t go to bars ( bad memories of getting drunk, women, etc); “I have to be doing something when at the beach”: fishing, playing football or volleyball, playing with the kids… ; This man never learned how to be alone with a woman partner at the beach; Men say there’s nothing to do at the beach: no problems to solve, no planned activities; they like to do the same things they do at home on weekends.

There is a difference between a quality partner vs. a controlled partner .  Quality partners learn how to feel feelings, enjoy new experiences, new skills, leaving their comfort zone, appreciate beauty, the senses, how to have fun. The “I don’t want to sit out and roast on the beach” men need to learn how to have fun alone with a woman, invent new ways; let go of fishing, etc.  It is also attitudes:  “I don’t do that anymore;  I don’t like that;  I don’t try new ways; I prefer to do it as I have always done it”.

It means redefining your experiences and inventing wonderful new experiences: New activities/skills/experiences/feelings: “I don’t sit and roast on the beach” becomes: sitting under umbrellas in the fall/winter/spring alone with a wonderful woman and experiencing the beauty, sounds, feel of the breeze, sand, water, each other, with a tall, wonderful drink and conversation; get a condo/room ON the beach; watching the sunrise, sunset; the moon and stars “rise”, the constellations; going for long walks, holding hands, talking; reading and sharing the books; taking “naps” together(bring the Viagra); establish new traditions, rituals ( not from the old marriage, or with the kids, or from when you were young(unhealthy habits); massages; baths together, fixing wonderful grownup meals together, exploring tastes from the sea…

Marriages don’t die, great sex doesn’t die if partners put lots of focus on each other. Couples cannot concentrate only on children, but must focus and invest in quality time with their partners, alone. Men must learn how to be with women in a quality way. Middle age men must relearn how to be with women as a middle age person, letting go of old, bad experiences and attitudes of the young; letting go of how you were with kids around. Women don’t stop having sex because they want to. They stop having sex with a husband because he only shows interest in them when he wants sex. He does not nurture the relationship in the ways that a romantic relationship with a woman needs. If a man only touches me and nurtures me when he wants sex , I am going to feel neglected and un-sexy. I want to have sex with a man that is sexy, playful, fun (fun with a woman), respectful, encouraging, loving, giving, interesting, and puts a lot of effort into these things. I want to have sex with a man who is not boring when not in bed, and not boring in bed.

If you are dating a middle age man, you need to find out if the man is a quality partner in the above ways. The beach is just an example of a vacation/fun experience and a good test for lots of things.  Ask the man if he likes to vacation, when he last went on one, where he went, with whom, when he last went on a vacation alone with a romantic partner, what they did for fun, what “else” they did, the good parts, the bad parts. If he starts listing all the negatives, run. Ask him what he did (vacations/fun/dates) with his wife. Did they do it often? Did they go on lots of outings without the kids? (we don’t want to hear, “we couldn’t afford it”; couples must invest in alone/romantic times or they will lose their most precious investment); romantic outings do not have to cost a lot of money; it just takes an investment of time, creativity, eagerness, planning together.

Take him on a “vacation”, away from his home! This will tell you a lot!

What Women Want: men who can find and feel paradise with a woman

In the last article, we talked about the beach as an example of a place to find out if a man can be sensual, feel, and really be with a woman and with nature and beauty; to be fully in the moment and fully with a woman. If a man cannot relax and find wonder in being with a woman in paradise, then it is unlikely your every day romantic life will prosper. We have heard the phrase, “ the honeymoon’s over”. A couple goes on a honeymoon which is full of love, sex, being all over each other, enjoying each other, and then some of us go “home” and forget that life with each other is supposed to continue to be loving, sharing and enjoying one another, and going on “honeymoons”. When those things stop, the honeymoon truly is over.

So, for many men, the beach is not paradise. Linda was not sure these men had a “paradise”. They were not connected enough to life and living, loving, to themselves, to feel much of anything except negativity. They all seemed very good at complaining, judging, criticizing. They all liked to tell Linda what to do, and how to do things, and to give directions. So what is this thing where these men like to give directions, but will not take directions? They all seemed unhappy to Linda, though they said they were happy. There was no enthusiasm and joy in these men— no inner peace. They were unable to feel love and love others. You hear the suggestion to “stop and smell the roses”. So many men cannot or will not do this; In the same way they cannot go to the beach and feel and smell and listen and see the unbelievable beauty and oneness with the universe and nature. You cannot “do the beach” if you are hyperactive, if you cannot stop thinking, thinking, thinking, if you cannot slow down and pause. You cannot be open to the newness and wonders of the beach if your mind is polluted with past stories, past ways of “doing it” — if you are a closed person— if you fear newness— if you are driven by I must, I should—if you must have a “plan”, if you are unable to enjoy the now and shut out the past and future (fear and worry)—if you are a controller. All of these men did not understand when Linda wanted to end their “relationships”. They thought things were going well. Not!

People who cannot enjoy the beach have forgotten how to play and feel, hear, see beauty, smell, when they are around beauty and wonder; how to be still and focus. They usually are very good at “business” and achieving external power. They have lost internal power: the ability to know and “control” their soul, heart and senses. In the movie Pretty Woman, Edward is led by Vivian to take a day off from “business” and walk in the grass barefooted, to do simple things, eat simply, go to a diner, eat a hot dog, read a book to her in the park, talk (about things other than business), just while away the day, no plans, doing what you want to do next, having thoughts and feelings about what you want to do next…  He had forgotten how to do these things, and the importance of doing these things. He had moved into a grown up zone of staying in his comfort zone: work. He felt external power there, and talent. We, as adults, must be able to leave our comfort zones and learn and seek balance in our lives; not allow the child in us to be wiped away by values and visions of material things, power, prestige: external power.

Edward loved what he felt when he walked in the grass in bare feet. He went back the next day by himself to experience it again. He felt, reflected, remembered how it made him feel about Vivian; He felt things! He had forgotten how to notice when he was feeling the other types of happiness, or maybe what real happiness was. These thoughts and feelings brought him back to his childhood for the first time since he was an adult. He started remembering what brought him pleasure as a child. He remembered loving building blocks, building things, creating things, being creative. His job involved destroying and buying businesses; bringing pain to others. He was very rich and had lots of external power. But he was not “happy”. He now realized he needed to work on this. He decided to join with a business owner that he had wanted to destroy and build a stronger and better business rather than destroying the business and the man and his family. He also started thinking about the fact that he and his father did not get along and that he did not want to “do life” as his father did it. It takes conscious thought and action to change our paths; to get us out of “automatic” and our comfort zones. In the movie, Edward did that: changed his path, actions, thoughts, and stepped way out of his comfort zone.

As children, most of us know how to play and do it to the max, feel our feelings, have immense curiosity and joy when we discover new wonders, love our parents, love ourselves(without ego), love life. When a child sees a beautiful flower he wants to touch it, get closer, smell it…When a child sees the sea and the beach he runs with delight to feel the sand, put his feet in the water, jump in, swim, play, build sand castles, whereby you get sand all over you. Where along the way do we lose these needs, wants and abilities?   “Life” and negative people enter our lives. We are told by controlling, negative parents to “stop doing that”, “that is childish”, “you are going to get sand all over you and have to take another shower, you are going to get sunburned, you are going to get stung by a jellyfish”, “the castle is just going to get washed away; you put it too close to the water”, “hurry up, we have to go shopping”. We are told not to feel deep feelings (especially boys), not to express deep feelings, etc; to “act like a man”, whatever that means.  It is important to rediscover the child in us, if it is lost.

This same person when taken to the beach by a woman, a grown up, will, at first,  walk on the sand in bare feet and not feel it, not experience it. He may be thinking he needs to keep his sandals on so that he “does not feel the sand and its warmth”. Maybe the feel of the sand irritates him, as do many things.  Or maybe he is thinking about “something else” and just forgets to take his sandals off. He forgets to grab the hand of the woman he is with.  He will have to retrain his soul, his heart, to feel, to focus, to see beauty and get overwhelmed by it.  He has forgotten how to play. His mind is elsewhere: thinking about other things. He will feel no desire to dip his feet in the water to feel the temperature and the feel of waves on his legs, pushing him. He will walk on the beach, or sit on the beach, but not be aware of what is going on around him: the beauty, happenings (birds, fish, boats, dolphins, changing tides, clouds, waves crashing), the warmth of the sun penetrating his skin and soul. He is afraid of getting sunburned but refuses to put sun screen on. He will later complain all night because he is sunburned. He will go in the water but has forgotten how to play in it. He will walk and notice the expensive condos, wonder how much they cost, wish he had one; will sit on the beach thinking about how he can work harder so that he can “acquire” one.  He is not there to play, experience wonder, beauty, peace, his soul, his heart, relax. At night, he will cook and eat, maybe go out to eat, come back and watch football or something. He does not even think about the sunset, then the moon and stars and the sounds of the night on the beach.

            Our adult habits (control; constant thinking: about the past and future) cause us not to be able to focus on beauty, our 5 senses and our internal needs. For instance, it helps when sitting in front of nature to close your eyes so that you can train yourself to focus on sounds, smells, breathing. For those of us who are out of practice, trying to focus on all 5 senses can be overwhelming, and we go back to “thinking” and lose the beauty of all 5 senses. When we close our eyes, we then hear everything, smell the air, etc. Maybe our sense of sight is well trained and overtakes our other senses that we don’t focus on.  And so it is with all our senses, abilities; what is not trained and used, we lose. So it is with love, feelings, thoughts… awareness.  Doing the beach is a learned skill, as is doing life.  The simple things are also the most extraordinary, but only the wise can see them (Paulo Coelho).

Relationships “on the beach”

As we discussed in previous articles, dating is the time to “discover” your potential life partner, and that control is one indicator of bad things ahead.  We mentioned that one of the indicators of a controlling person is the need to stay in “their comfort zone”. This person was given messages as a child: it is not OK to make mistakes: they develop a fear of failure; so they do not usually try new things; They feel very “safe” in their home, sometimes at work, and doing things that they have always done and are good at. Also, controllers are taught not to feel; not to feel deep feelings and express them. They must be in control of themselves.  We looked at an example of a date on a beach vacation.

Of course “doing the beach” is just an example of being able to enjoy life in the moment; to be able to enjoy moments where you cannot control, judge, cause what is going to happen next; of being able to relax and not think, not think of the past, the future, what is happening at work; to let go of “I must”, “I should”, “I need to”…

Linda never realized until dating that there were so many people who are “asleep” at the beach…asleep in life. As Father Anthony de Mello said, ”Most  people, even though they don’t know it, are asleep…they never understand the loveliness and the beauty of this thing that we call human existence”.  http://www.ascensiongateway.com/quotes/anthony-de-mello/index.htm    She also realized lots of “grown-up” men have pronounced comfort zones, where they feel comfortable, and don’t like leaving those comfort zones— to reach out and try and experience new things, new feelings. These men say they like trying new things, but they don’t. They say lots of things in their dating profiles, which are not true. Some of these men actually are not lying on purpose. They use the verbage, ”love to try new things; love the beach, am a romantic ,etc” . They just don’t know what those things mean. It was rather amazing.

So, for many men, the beach is not paradise. Linda was not sure these men had a “paradise”. They were not connected enough to life and living, loving, to themselves, to feel much of anything except negativity. They all seemed very good at complaining, judging, criticizing. They all liked to tell Linda what to do, and how to do things, and to give directions. So what is this thing where these men like to give directions, but will not take directions? They all seemed unhappy to Linda, though they said they were happy. There was no enthusiasm and joy in these men— no inner peace. They were unable to feel love and love others. You hear the suggestion to “stop and smell the roses”. So many men cannot or will not do this; In the same way they cannot go to the beach and feel and smell and listen and see the unbelievable beauty and oneness with the universe and nature. You cannot “do the beach” if you are hyperactive, if you cannot stop thinking, thinking, thinking, if you cannot slow down and pause. You cannot be open to the newness and wonders of the beach if your mind is polluted with past stories, past ways of “doing it” — if you are a closed person— if you fear newness— if you are driven by I must, I should—if you must have a “plan”, if you are unable to enjoy the now and shut out the past and future (fear and worry)—if you are a controller. All of these men did not understand when Linda wanted to end their “relationships”. They thought things were going well. Not!

Part of “being with someone” is being able to enjoy your life together. To talk, to feel, to laugh, play, to enjoy romance, enjoy the world around us together, to enjoy intimacy often, not just when having sex. When dating, we should figure out if our partner not only enjoys his or her fun activities with friends, and by themselves, but also when with us.  Are we in touch with each other, with beauty, with couple fun, with “making love”; are we good at “letting go” and just enjoying one another?  Does your partner just “need” someone to be with on dates, for dinner, etc., or do they want  to be with YOU? Do they experience joy and happiness when with you? Are they open to experiencing you and learning about you and liking what they learn?

Control in relationships

In my previous article I introduced the issue of “control” in relationships.  I identified it as one of the most negative “conditions” that keeps quality relationships from developing and that destroys relationships. There is an epidemic of control in this society and we need to stem it. Not only do we need to be able to identify a potential partner that is controlling, but we also need to identify controlling tendencies in ourselves, become self-aware and learn new and better skills, attitudes, perceptions, behaviors, so that we can be happy and contribute to happiness in our relationships.  We need to know what our values are. Do we/our partners value power, control, being right, being the best at the expense of others, etc.?  Or do we value kindness, peace, fun, happiness, enjoying the “now”, etc.? We, as adults, have to consciously decide to be positive, notice positives, and speak positives with those we care about: be respectful and encouraging, and not try to control others.

As I mentioned, the dating months are a good time to identify positives and negatives.  Following is an example of control in a dating situation.

Sam was a man who professed to “love the beach”. Linda and Sam  went to the beach for 4 days. Linda quickly learned Sam could not do the beach without booze—lots of it. He could only sit still on the beach if he had a drink in his hand. He was a planner. He had planned all his “drinks” for the week and brought all the fixings. Before leaving to go out of town, he also planned what they would eat each day, at each meal and for appetizers. Most of the fixings he bought beforehand. Sam was a control freak. He wanted to control what Linda did, when she did it, how she did it, so that he could do what he wanted to do, when and how he wanted to do it. He told her when they would go down to the beach each day, how long they would stay, what they would bring, when and what lunch and dinner would be. He was a person who went to the beach as a child and young adult. He was raised on “doing activities” while at the beach: fishing, crabbing, kayaking, shopping, etc. So he also had not learned how to “enjoy the beach”. Whenever there was a pause in the day with Linda he would say, “OK, what now?” Pausing, just relaxing, just “being”, was not in his makeup. One day they needed to go to the grocery store for dinner. Sam had decided what the menu would be. They traveled the aisles with Sam saying, “We need this….” Linda would say, ”Let’s get this”. Sam would say no.

The final indicators came on the departure morning—time to pack. Sam decided to pack the ice chest with the vast amount of food and drinks left in the refrigerator. He got started. Linda could tell there was a “strict” way to pack his ice chest. About 5 minutes later he said, ”why don’t you come help!?”  She started placing things in the chest. Immediately he said, ”no, no, that goes here, that goes there; you have to do it right.” So Linda walked away so that Sam could do it according to his rules. Out at the huge SUV, Sam started putting stuff into the car. Linda started helping, putting her stuff in. Immediately Sam said,” No, that can’t go in yet. No that has to go there”. He took her things out, so she walked away and let Sam do it. He was very perturbed at Linda. He told her so. So she explained to him that he was a control freak and had been all week and had to have things his way and that they would not be compatible. She found him over the top weird. Those are things you uncover by spending 4 days with a person, especially on a “vacation”. In the mornings he would stand in the doorway of the bathroom while she got ready and tap his foot. She thought at first he was just enjoying watching her get ready, but soon realized it was his way of saying, “hurry up, I’m ready to go”.

Sam is controlling. We may tend, in the beginning of dating, to think that this person is trying to “take care of me”, do nice things for me. There is a huge difference. Controlling behavior is a syndrome made up of lots of behaviors, attitudes… Look back at the four indicators of control. Awareness is step one.